FOXBORO — It didn’t take long for Randall Gay to realize he was back in New England.

“Those steps,” the former Patriots cornerback said with a laugh, motioning to the long stairway that leads from Gillette Stadium up to the practice fields. “We don’t have steps at our practice facility in New Orleans.”

Gay, as well as former New England fullback Heath Evans and tight end Dave Thomas, got a chance to relive some old memories on Tuesday as they joined the Saints for the first of three joint practice sessions with the Patriots.

“It brings back good memories,” said Gay, who was signed by the Patriots as an undrafted free agent in 2004 out of LSU and spent four seasons in New England before signing with the Saints.

“This was a place where basically I made my name as a football player, with the Patriots, and I thank them for giving me the opportunity to be in the NFL right now, and provide for my family and let me go to New Orleans where I was able to win another championship. I have great memories here.”

In his four years with the Patriots, Gay was known as one of the funnier, more engaging characters in the New England locker room, and so it wasn’t a surprise to hear there was plenty of chirping in his direction over the course of Tuesday morning’s practice.

“Every time I lined up over there, I would hear something. But it was all in fun, because when you line up against me, I'm going to tell them something too,” he said with a grin. “At one time, they were my family, just like the Saints are my family now. These guys, they were my family once, and I still consider them like family. But right now, we're competing and trying to make each other better.”

Gay spent an eventful four seasons in New England, but none were more memorable than his rookie season when he was pressed into starting service after veteran Ty Law went down with a foot injury. In his place, Gay started nine games (he ended up playing in 15 overall) and was a starter on the team that ended up winning Super Bowl XXXIX.

“I grew up,” Gay said of his time as a young player with the Patriots. “I was thrown into the fire and it made me grow.

“I didn’t want to be that guy who broke the Patriots run, because they had won a Super Bowl the year before, and here comes this rookie free agent out there, and has to start for Ty Law, and it's like, 'Oh, man.' There was a lot of pressure on me, but I handled it well.”

The reaction to seeing the practice field sparked the same emotion for Evans, who played for the Patriots from 2005 through 2008.

“I really don't think I'm an emotional guy, but you walk out and you take this hike and you see the fan appreciation here ... even just the style of practice,” he said. “I miss my time here — it was a special time here.

“There was a lot of man-hugging going on out there.”

While with the Patriots, Evans quickly developed a rep as a stand-up guy, both on the field and with the media. That was the case again yesterday, as he quickly attracted a large media contingent when he left the field after the morning practice session.

When his deal ran out at the end of the 2008 season, the burly fullback said it was a difficult decision to leave, but in the end, he said he saw a lot of the same elements when he went for his “so-called recruiting trip” to New Orleans last March that were present within the New England organization.

“You get that taste of winning,” Evans said. “And that free agency process last year really taught me how to look for the winning components. I wasn’t going to leave a winning tradition to go back to losing. I had tasted enough of that. And I’d like to say I knew what I was doing. Did I know we were going to win the Super Bowl? No. But I knew that we had a chance.”

Evans said there were plenty of man-hugs on the field Tuesday morning, the time for catching up with old teammates has past.

“I think the offseason was ample time to get that done,” he said. “We’ll come out here and practice and you can see the mannerisms between the two teams so there is a lot of respect and a lot of competitive nature going on this morning. At the same time, we are here for business and we aren’t going to open our playbook to them and they aren’t going to open their playbook for us.”

Of the three, Thomas has the least history with the Patriots. The tight end was taken in the third round of the 2006 draft by New England, and spent two-plus seasons with the Patriots (he was sidelined for most of the 2007 campaign, playing just two games because of injury) before he was dealt to New Orleans for a draft pick.

“It was a kind of weird coming out of the visitors’ locker room, but I kind of knew my way around so that was good, and it’s nice to be back up here,” Thomas said.

“Everyone was asking, ‘Where’s this? Where’s that?’ We don’t know our way around the visitors’ locker room too well, but it’s good to be back.”
 
Thomas’ best season with New England was likely his rookie year (2006), when he had 11 catches for 159 yards and a touchdown. But the Texas product was dealt shortly before the start of the 2009 season to the Saints, where he finished his first year in New Orleans with 35 catches for 356 yards and a touchdown. Now, he certainly looks to be a fixture in New Orleans’ high-octane passing attack — at one point in Tuesday afternoons practice during 11-on-11 drills, he caught four straight passes from Saints quarterback Drew Brees.

Despite the fact that Thomas’ finish with the Patriots was less-than-ideal — after taking a bad penalty late in an early November 2008 loss to the Colts, he didn’t catch a pass the rest of the season — he holds no grudge against the Patriots, saying he enjoyed the opportunity to catch up with Belichick on Tuesday morning and see some of his former teammates.

“He was just saying congratulations on winning the Super Bowl,” Thomas said of his conversation with Belichick. “He was just really nice, and it’s good to catch up with him a little bit. Some things never change; he still runs a good program and it has been a lot of fun going against him.

“I’ve got a lot of respect for the guys out here. I really enjoyed my time in New England and have a lot of really good friends that still play here, so it’s good to catch up with them.”